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By Pfc. Alicia Torbush
20th Public Affairs Detachment
Kuwait - Service members at military bases in Kuwait, and Life Support Area are being given a unique gift this holiday season, a chance to call home for free with a 60-minute calling card donated by the non-profit organization, Cell Phones for Soldiers.
"CPFS has donated about $150,000 worth of calling cards for service members here," said Maj. Dennis McCool, director of public works, Area Support Group-Kuwait.
Cell Phones for Soldiers was co-founded in 2004 by teenagers, Brittany and Robbie Bergquist, residents of Norwell, Mass.
The original goal of CPFS was to help one local Soldier from Massachusetts pay his cell phone bill, said Brittany Bergquist in an email interview. She explained that after doing some more research, they learned that more Soldiers were struggling to pay for the high cost of calling home while deployed.
"We knew the importance of keeping in touch with loved ones and wanted to make sure that all military members had a way to call home for free," said Bergquist.
McCool became involved through his connections with contacts of patriotic organizations. He saw a way for these civilian organizations to support the troops in the Middle East through installation support programs such as Morale, Welfare and Recreation and United Services Organizations.
CPFS takes donated cell phones, recycles them and uses the funds raised to purchase 60-minute calling cards to give to service members who are deployed or stationed away from their home state.
"We have raised close to $3 million to buy prepaid phone cards to help troops with their communication needs," said Bergquist. "We have been able to send over 500,000 phone cards with 1 hour of talk time on them to the Middle East and at bases around the world."
CPFS has donated 5,500 already this year and 15,000 total cards are expected, for service members to call their families this holiday season, said McCool.
"Our organization has come very far since it began in 2004," said Bergquist. "We started with $21 from our piggy banks and now we are a multi-million dollar 501c3 non-profit organization that has made a huge difference in the lives of our American troops and their loved ones."
| Date Taken: | 12.31.2008 |
| Date Posted: | 12.31.2008 09:50 |
| Story ID: | 28316 |
| Location: | KW |
| Web Views: | 213 |
| Downloads: | 202 |
This work, Cell Phones for Soldiers Donates calling cards for the holidays, by SPC Alicia Clark, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
